Beginner's Guide To The Bloomberg Terminal: News And Market Monitors

In addition to analyzing individual securities, a common use of the Bloomberg terminal is to monitor news updates and financial market movements. Here too, there is an endless array of possibilities, and which one users prefer is often a matter of personal choice. However, there are a couple of common screens that can serve as a starting point for new users.
Note: When in doubt, the menu functions can also help here. The general menu that you see for most asset classes (including equities, currencies, commodities, etc.) will usually contain listings for market monitors that provide a good starting place for analysis. (For related reading, see Forex Basics: Setting Up An Account.)

NewsThe best place to begin looking for news on Bloomberg is by typing <TOP> and then hitting <ENTER>. The <TOP> function brings up a page of the top news stories of the day, which are updated on an ongoing basis. Selecting any of these headlines will bring up the full story. Within the <TOP> function, there are additional sub-menus that will allow you to view news stories that are filtered by asset class, geographic region or topic. For instance, you can choose to see the top worldwide stories, the top U.S. stories or the top stories for stocks, for bonds or for almost any other category you choose. You can also (if you are using your own personal Bloomberg) choose to set the default for top news to whichever category you prefer, so that when you type in <TOP> you see the news category that is most important to you. The screenshot below shows an example of the screen for top worldwide news headlines. (For additional reading, see Financial "News": When Opinion Becomes Fact.)

As mentioned above, news can also be customized in a wide variety of ways. For instance, if you are primarily interested in the stock market, you can access top news for stocks. The screenshot below displays this. As you can see, the stock news screen is further broken down into sections: first for worldwide headlines, then by continent with North America, followed by Europe and finally Asia. Users seeking even greater detail can click on the regions in white to access stock news headlines specific to a region or country, such as the United States, Canada, Eastern Europe, etc.

Market MonitorThere are a number of market monitor pages that cover a variety of asset classes, as well as some that cover a single asset class or market sector. The monitor below is accessed by typing <PX1> <ENTER> into your Bloomberg. The PX1 screen is a little bit more focused on the U.S. Treasury bond market, while also giving updates on the Dow, Nasdaq, S&P, as well as the gold and oil markets.

The screenshot below is another example of a market monitor that is primarily focused on the bond market. This screen can be viewed by typing <BTMM> <ENTER>. Although this is another bond market screen, you will notice that it covers a broader array of securities than the PX1 function discussed above. In addition to U.S. Treasuries, the BTMM screen shows markets for a wide variety of money market instruments, as well as mortgage-backed bonds and currencies. The BTMM screen also includes quotes on the Dow, Nasdaq and S&P, as well as oil. Finally, the screen contains a listing of the day's major economic releases, making it easy to keep track of this as well. In addition to PX1 and BTMM, there are a multitude of additional market monitor screens that primarily focus on movements in the bond markets. As you can imagine, there is no one screen that is "best," and which one users prefer is ultimately a matter of personal choice. (For more, see The Money Market.)

In addition to monitors that primarily track bond markets, there are also a wide variety of monitors that focus on equity markets. As a good starting place, you can pull up the monitor below by typing <WEI> <GO> into your keyboard. As you can see, this monitor displays equity index movements from around the globe. You can get more detail on additional markets in a given region by drilling down into the menu. For instance, by clicking on the "Asia/Pacific" heading, you can access updates on the markets in that region that were unable to fit on the front page due to space constraints.

Note: On most of these monitor pages, as well as many other screens, any of the headers in a white font with a number in front of it indicate an additional sub-menu that can be accessed. For instance, on the screen below there is a "1) Americas", a "2) EMEA" and a "3) Asia/Pacific" that can all be accessed either by clicking on them or by typing in the appropriate number and hitting <ENTER>. There are also choices at the top marked by "95) Settings" and "96) News" that represent sub-menus as well.